#MumbaiSuffersWhoCares

As you enter Vashi, the gateway to Navi Mumbai, you are greeted with mangroves destroyed by construction debris and, within a couple of minutes, the plundered Parsik Hills at Turbhe present the ghastly damage done to the ecological balance.

This is only a jhalak. You can see the environmental destruction all over. It does not require an expert committee inquiry to assess the irreparable damage being done to the ecology of Mumbai Metropolitan Region.

The social communication campaign - #BoomCityDoomCity – which has been launched on the Earth Day to shake the conscience of the powers that be and the Internet generation by focusing on the rampant destruction of mangroves and hills in Mumbai Metropolitan Region has been received well.

Now, as the World Environment Day (June 5) approaches, let us reinvigorate the campaign with a new line: #mumbaisufferswhocares and tweet @CMOMaharashtra.

In our primary schools, we were taught that it takes millions of years to form hills and mountains, but just few years to destroy them!

The constant plundering of the Parsik Hills in Navi Mumbai under the garb of quarrying has already been destroying the nature and harming the people for decades now. An entire generation grew up with respiratory diseases. This is the tragic case of vanishing hills. Hills are our heritage and we have no business to destroy them.

According to a recent study by Maharashtra Pollution Control Board, stone crushing units emit particulate matter — small pollutant particles than can enter the lungs and cause ailments — almost 100 times the safe limit.

The District Level Environment Impact Assessment Authority (DEIAA), Thane, met on February 02, 2018 and discussed in detail the situation of 74 quarry sites at Kukshet, Shivawane, Pawane, Bonsari, Turbhe and Borivali – all along the Parsik Hill range, Navi Mumbai.

During the meeting the Deputy Conservator of Forests has raised objection to violation of quarrying limits in CIDCO area where 264.1 hectares has been mined against the permissible area of 138.07 hectares.

The mangrove destruction is no small issue either. As mangrove warrior Nandakumar Pawar says:“The importance of protecting mangroves cannot be underestimated in the interest of the coast line and the people living there, yet the authorities are turning a blind eye to the widespread destruction by dumping garbage and debris in the creek.”

Pawar, founder director of Shri Ekavira Aai Pratishthan (SEAP) which is on a crusade to maintain the ecological balance, supports #mumbaisufferswhocares.

The campaign is not against the infrastructure and housing for the masses. But it should not come at the cost of environment.

Mumbai is a city of dreams and it won’t take long for the City to perish if the wanton destruction continues.

So wake Mumbai and sign this petition and send tweets to CM, the CEO of Maharashtra.

There is an unfortunate misconception that coastal community means the Koli and Agri (fisher folk and salt pan workers) communities. Those living along Marine Drive to Palm Beach Road and Vashi to Virar are also coastal communities.

Have we quickly forgotten the Chowpatty floods and the Mithi River disaster?